'Devotees can secure traslacion sans cops'

ABS-CBN News

Devotees occupy Jones bridge as they take part in the annual procession of the Black Nazarene on Monday. Millions of barefoot devotees attended the procession with at least 900 provided with medical attention, according to local authorities. Romeo Ranoco, Reuters

Devotees of the Black Nazarene can secure the Black Nazarene procession even without the presence of law enforcers, National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Director Chief Superintendent Oscar Albayalde said Monday.

In an interview on ANC’s “Talkback,” Albayalde said he believes devotees have enough discipline to manage the annual traslacion on their own.

“They can do it without security forces,” he said, noting that lay marshalls of the procession take it upon themselves to discipline unruly devotees.

Albayalde said policemen do not have problems managing the devotees since they know exactly what to do.

“Basically, these devotees are very manageable because they are very disciplined. They know exactly what to do before and after the mass. They have these things that they have to do,” he said. “Everything they do it’s like step by step they know what to do."

A total of 5,762 law enforcers were deployed to secure the Black Nazarene procession this year.

Albayalde said they divided the procession’s route into 10 segments and assigned around 200 policemen per segment.

Asked for his assessment on the 2017 traslacion, Albayalde said he the public complied with the rules and advisories of the Church and law enforcers.

“We have not received any report of any major incident, any crimes with regards to this traslacion procession and I think all our efforts paid off,” he said.

Around 3 million devotees flocked to Quiapo to join the Black Nazarene procession.